


Tea Breaks and other Emotional Coping Mechanisms

by ColebaltBlue



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Gen, Minor Swearing, sexism in the workplace
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-14
Updated: 2015-12-14
Packaged: 2018-05-06 17:22:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,546
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5425436
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ColebaltBlue/pseuds/ColebaltBlue
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Molly meets Sherlock Holmes for the first time and this is why despite the fact that he's sometimes rude and inconsiderate, she'll always like him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tea Breaks and other Emotional Coping Mechanisms

**Author's Note:**

  * For [horrorfangirl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/horrorfangirl/gifts).



> I was last in a lab about 10 years ago so apologies to those of you that are in them regularly that are reading this going, "that's not how it...".

"Don't cry, don't cry, don't cry," Molly mumbled to herself as she dropped the blood carefully onto the slide. She caught the eye of the other female lab tech across the bench. They shared a commiserating glance. The door slammed behind her and she jumped, messing up her slide. She set it down and sighed deeply. 

"Go take a minute, Molly, wash your face. I'll prep your slides for you," Sara said gently.

"No, no, I'm ok," Molly replied.

"Molly…"

Molly bit back a cry of frustration and yanked her gloves off and tossed them angrily at the rubbish bin. Yanking off her lab coat, she left it on her stool and hurried out of the lab. 

Sara was right. A minute in the restroom and a splash of cold water would do wonders for her. She'd bring back tea for them both as thanks for the break. It wasn't anything that she hadn't done for Sara a million times before. Or that Sara had done for her just last week. Peter was an asshole and was loath to let any opportunity to be a jerk to Molly and Sara pass by unused.

She wasn't watching where she was going and bumped into someone as she turned the corner toward the bathrooms. "Sorry," she mumbled to the black wool coat, blue scarf that would have cost her a weeks pay, and a mess of dark curls. He snorted in response, but she hurried on, unwilling to deal with someone else being a jerk.

When she arrived back at the lab fifteen minutes later, it was to her slides prepared, labeled, and laid out neatly at her workstation and a grateful smile from Sara.

"I don't suppose you happened to run into anyone in the hall? Tall, dark, absurdly attractive?" Sara asked with a twinkle in her eye.

"No? Well, yes, quite literally. Why?"

"Oh he just stuck his head in the lab harrumphed and left. Wondered if you had seen where he was headed."

"I wasn't really paying attention."

"Oh, our loss then," Sara replied.

Molly put the entire incident out of her mind.

Two days later she was working in the lab alone. She had left the overhead lights off, hoping that Peter wouldn't notice she was in if it wasn't obvious. Peter was a fellow graduate student, the same cohort as her, and a year behind Sara. But he walked around the place like he owned it and the female graduate students were either major annoyances or his personal assistants. He had no problem being equal parts demanding, creepy, and rude and had no respect for the valuable work that Molly and Sara did. Doctor Stamford, when they complained, listened with a sympathetic ear, but did nothing. 

The bench in the back was out of direct view from the window in the lab door and she was just writing up reports from experiments that had been running over the weekend. The door to the lab banged open and she jumped on her stool, fingers mistyping on her laptop keyboard. Mr. Tall, Dark, and Wool Coat stood in the doorway, looking thunderous.

"Does everyone around this place treat science like a joke?" he asked.

"Um, no?" Molly replied, unsure if he was asking her, or just asking the question in general.

His eyes bored into her.

"Where is Doctor Stamford?" he asked.

"Um, in his office?"

He stood there, staring.

"Second floor? Down the hall?" she tried.

He whirled and left, the door banged shut behind him and Molly jumped again. 

"Perhaps a tea break," she said under her breath to herself.

The next Monday she got to the lab a little early, as was her habit, so she could avoid Peter in the mornings. It was always best to be in and working before he got there. Peter made her uncomfortable. He made all the female graduate students uncomfortable. Some, like Molly, he would imply had no right to be in the lab or anywhere around the equipment because, according to him, it was a scientific fact women weren't as smart as men. Others, like Sara, he would try to assign his work to. And then there was poor Emily, who managed to find the courage to tell him she wasn't interested in going on a date with him and he hadn't left her alone since. 

When Molly, Sara, and Emily had all gone to Doctor Stamford, the lab director, to complain, he had simply assigned Emily and Peter to work on different days. Which meant Molly and Sara almost always worked the same lab hours as Peter. It was fine though, they both worked entirely out of the lab and did their notes at a small desk in the corner. Peter had taken over their shared graduate student office and treated it entirely as his own. It was clear that they weren't welcome.

That morning, she was working quietly on her experiments when the man with the dark curls and black wool coat entered the lab quietly. He didn't even glance at her before tossing his coat over a stool, rolling up his sleeves - he had beautiful arms, she thought to herself - and settling in on a stool in front of a microscope.

She tucked her head down even more, trying to work as quietly as possible. No one had told her they were getting a new person in the lab, but Doctor Stamford often just told Peter those kinds of things and assumed he'd pass the information on to the rest of them.

Right on cue, an hour later than he should've been, Peter came into the lab. He noticed the new guy right away and opened his mouth to say something, Gorgeous Curls and Cut Arms just glared him into silence. Molly bit back a smile.

"Did you run the analysis over the weekend, Molly?" Peter asked her.

"No?" Molly replied carefully, "there wasn't one on my schedule." She cringed in anticipation of what was sure to come out of Peter's mouth next. 

He rolled his eyes and glanced at Tall, Pale, and Slender seeking a bit of male camaraderie in "women, right?" annoyance. But Cheekbones That Could Cut Glass didn't look up from what he was doing. Peter dropped his book loudly on his bench and stalked over to the bench against the wall. Molly surreptitiously double-checked her assignment book. She definitely didn't have an analysis to run over the weekend - just some samples incubating that needed checking. 

Peter was mumbling under his breath and she caught words like _incompetent, have to do everything myself, can't be trusted, idiots, just meeting a quota_. Molly sighed as quietly as she could. Beautiful Eyes and the Faintest Hint of Freckles clinked a pipette against a beaker softly.

The next hour was blessedly calm. Too calm, really, Molly realized.

Peter leapt up in an explosion of fury.

"These calibrations are wrong!" he yelled. He whirled around and pointed a finger at Molly, "you fucked with my centrifuge!" 

Molly glanced to the small centrifuge on the table. She hadn't touched it for days.

"Uh, no," she said, softly.

"Yes you did, you dumb bitch. You've been running that analysis and you knew I had it set up for my experiment but you used it anyway."

"I really didn't," she said.

"You probably wouldn't even know what a centrifuge was if your life depended on it! That was hours of work! And now I'll have to redo it all, because you are too much of a moron to calibrate a centrifuge properly!"

"But, I-"

"If you're referring to the centrifuge on the table in front of you, I can quite assure you Ms. Hooper did not, in fact, touch it," Voice of Sex interrupted. "And if you weren't so busy blaming others for your own, very clear, and very inept failings, you could see that your results are because of your failure to check your work properly."

Molly's jaw dropped open. First of all Oh God He Knew Her Name, knew her name. Second of all, no one had dared call Peter inept before. Although Molly, Sara, and Emily were all quite aware he was.

Peter was speechless.

"Any moron can see that you mixed the wrong compound in to your samples. It's a stupid mistake. One that Ms. Hooper most certainly would not make."

"Who do you-" Peter started.

"My name is Sherlock Holmes and don't think I haven't noticed your sheer incompetence, Mr. Warnick, and reported it to Doctor Stamford. In the meantime, you're breaking my concentration. Get out."

"I'll have you-"

"Get. Out." Sherlock Holmes interrupted. 

Peter looked at a loss for words. He glanced at Molly, but she just looked at him directly with no expression. No support would be coming from her. He gathered his things in a huff and stormed out of the lab. Molly glanced to Sherlock, who was thoroughly absorbed in his work around as if nothing had happened.

She opened her mouth to thank him.

"Two sugars." He said, over her.

"Pardon?"

"Tea, that's what you do when you've had an emotional upset? No doubt a habit picked up from your grandmother. So when you go, fetch one for me, two sugars."

"Right, tea," Molly said.


End file.
